7 Tips to Ace Your Next Job Interview

2016-10-10

Congratulations! If you’re reading this, we assume your application made it to the next round and you’re preparing for a job or City Year interview. The interview is a space for you to tell your prospective employer more about your background, experiences, and to express why you want this position.

Whether your interview takes place over the phone, in person, or on Skype, here are some tips to help you prepare:

Know our mission

Familiarize yourself with the organization or the business’ mission and have a basic understanding of what they do before heading into your meeting. If you're interviewing with City Year, you should also be knowledgeable about the City Year AmeriCorps member role and what it entails. Understanding these things will help you express why you are a good fit for this position throughout your interview.

Keep it professional

It is important that you arrive on time, dress professionally, take a moment to pause and think before responding to questions. It’s totally fine to ask questions if you do not understand or need clarification on the questions. This will help you keep your answers relevant to the questions being asked. Be mindful of the tone and pace of your responses and remember to smile! Be energetic, and express your interest in your responses.

Highlight experience working with children and youth

Whether you were a camp counselor, babysitter or tutor, be sure that you can speak to the lessons you learned from your experiences. You should also be prepared to speak about the strategies you used to engage and connect with children and youth in those roles and how that experience will help you succeed at City Year.

Consider your contribution

We all have our own unique experiences and background. Consider your own and think about the skills and perspectives you can bring to the organization. Think about how these will help you be successful in your work here.

Demonstrate Your Self Awareness

Similarly, it is important to be mindful of how your experience, background, and skills shape your own perspective. At City Year, our corps works alongside highly diverse teammates and students. You should be prepared to share your approach to working with people who are different than you.

Reflect on your team role

Teamwork is important to many job roles. It’s also actually one of our organization’s core values. You will spend every day working alongside a diverse team. Think about how you like to operate on a team: what do you bring, what do you rely on teammates for, and what have you learned from these experiences?

Consider what you want to get out of this experience

Serving as a City Year AmeriCorps member is a challenging and rewarding experience. You will give a lot but you will also get a lot. Spend some time reflecting on what you want to gain from this experience. You should be able to identify areas you want to improve, skills you want to build, and how the opportunity to serve with City Year will help you achieve your future goals.

Now you’re ready for the actual interview. At City Year, your interview will most likely be via the phone or Skype and is estimated to last approximately 45 to 60 minutes. Plan to be in a quiet place with minimal background noise and good cell reception. When you’re not worrying over tech issues, you’ll be able to think more clearly on your responses.